Through the course of a fantasy hockey season, I'll occasionally make reference to the "quality start" metric, a statistic developed by the stat gurus over at Hockey Prospectus, and defined as "an idea blatantly lifted from baseball, Quality Starts were one of Hockey Prospectus' first contributions back in 2009 as a measure of whether a goaltender 'gave his team a chance to win.' In order to record a Quality Start, the starting goalie must stop at least a league average number of shots (typically 91.3 percent prior to 2009-10, and 91.7 percent since), or play at least as well as a replacement-level goalie (88.5 percent) while allowing two goals or fewer."

Sometimes, the numbers don't really yield any new information -- some netminders with a high percentage of quality starts are already listed amongst the top-flight options in fantasy -- but other times, the metric can guide us towards some goalies that are perhaps being overlooked, due to the fact that their team isn't holding up their end of the bargain on the offensive end. On the flip side, there are some goalies who are earning wins more often than they should, based upon a strong offense, and these goaltenders may be in for a rude awakening if and when the offensive production cools off.

Culling through the data, I analyzed NHL goalies that have started at least four games this season, a list that runs 49 deep. Here's the Top 10:


http://espn.go.com/fantasy/hockey/st...quality-starts